“Why bother? At my age, breast cancer is the least of my worries,” says a patient in the opening vignette of “Helping Patients Make Health Care Decisions,” the latest publication from the Gerontological Society of America. This new guide equips health care providers with essential strategies to support informed, value-based decision-making with their older patients, recognizing the many factors that influence how individuals approach their health care.
As the population ages, providers must navigate not just clinical facts but also patients’ concerns, preferences, cultural values, and financial limitations. Through compelling real-life vignettes and evidence-based guidance, the publication demonstrates how effective, empathetic communication can build trust and improve health outcomes.
Topics include addressing age-related bias, understanding religious and cultural health beliefs, and fostering collaborative, respectful provider-patient relationships.
From helping a patient overcome vaccine hesitancy, to tailoring care to dietary preferences rooted in cultural tradition, to honoring religious refusals of certain treatments, the freely and publicly available “Helping Patients Make Health Care Decisions” encourages a patient-centered approach that balances medical guidance with individual autonomy.
The guide is a vital tool for anyone engaged in advancing high-quality, respectful care for older adults.
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The Gerontological Society of America (GSA), founded in 1945, is the nation’s oldest and largest interdisciplinary organization focused on aging. It serves more than 6,000 members in over 50 countries. GSA’s vision, meaningful lives as we age, is supported by its mission to foster excellence, innovation, and collaboration to advance aging research, education, practice, and policy. GSA is home to the National Academy on an Aging Society (a nonpartisan public policy institute) and the National Center to Reframe Aging.